Goings on.

From e-mail dated April 26, 2010.

So, what things have been going on this week?
Ranjeet is coming to understand more and more about our Savior each day. We still haven't talked with him about the Restoration—but we are doing that tonight. But we felt like the Restoration has no meaning if he didn't first have a testimony of Jesus Christ. He is starting to make connections with the JoVos, and we've really got to get him to come to church on Sunday, so that's our big push this week.
Isatu is wonderful. She is SO excited about the gospel! We had a great lesson with her and her kids this week about the spirit and Victoria (a convert of 2 weeks) came with us on joint teach and it was AMAZING! They were able to really connect with each other and Victoria bore testimony of her experiences with the spirit. Then we asked Isatu if she has ever had an experience where she has felt the spirit and she told us about a day when she and her daughter were praying together and she just felt that He was there—she said it was the strongest feeling she has ever had and she wants to be able to feel it more and more often. She said, „I know that as I read in the scriptures and pray every day that that feeling from the spirit can be with me each day.“ When she came to church on Sunday, Victoria was able to lead her around and they have become good friends. I love members!
We got another member referral this week who is super positive! Her name is Brigitte. Another recent convert brought a friend to church last week Sunday and she invited us to come over this week. We had an appointment with her on Saturday and she knows the church is true—she has been learning from this friend about the church for a while—and she wants to pray about being baptized. She is from Togo and speaks French. Her English is pretty good-- but she prefers hearing the gospel in her own language or in French, so her friend (Folly) came to the appointment. We basically said a total of 10 sentences in 40 minutes and he taught the rest of the lesson. We had studied things that morning to teach her, and it was amazing--he would say them without us even mentioning it--he said, "I just felt the spirit telling me that that is what she needed to hear and what you wanted to say." She is actually also friends with Victoria—they went to the same church before—so Victoria was able to explain some things to her about the church when she came again on Sunday. Basically Victoria and Folly are going to double the size of the ward in Den Haag :)
We also had a good couple of appointments with Yvonne and Quincy. We talked with them this week about baptism and they are thinking about it. They are a little hesitant because they just got baptized a year and a half ago in another church, but they are praying about it and seriously considering it. They are such a wonderful family.
We had interviews this week with President Brubaker, and afterwards Zr. Brubaker came with us for a couple of hours to teach. Neither of our appointments showed up, so we went and decided to knock on some house boats! I've actually never tried contacting the people who live in houseboats (I've always thought about it, but never actually done it). It was really interesting, and we had a really long conversation with one woman who said we could come back if ever in the neighborhood, but didn't want to make an appointment. It was quite the time.
Oh! Exciting news! We had a lesson with Zr. Santos this week and talked with her about the status of her and her boyfriend getting married. She said that they want to get married, but he doesn't want to get baptized in the church and he only wants to marry in a Catholic church and she was really sad because she wants to get baptized. We looked at each other and said, "So the only thing holding you back from getting married is that he will only marry in a Catholic church?" And she said yes. We were able to tell her that it doesn't matter where they get married, just as long as they get married. She lit up! She thought that because she wanted to become a member of this church that she couldn't get married in another church. She got so excited and they are now starting to make wedding plans! Pray that they will be able to get married soon. Man, I would love to be here for their baptism-- but I'm not sure that will happen-- the mission flies by way too fast!
...Well, I'll add in a thought I had while studying in the Book of Mormon this morning. I was reading in Mosiah 14 and the last three verses really stuck out to me. I pondered them for quite some time. One of the insights I got was about how when in the Old Testament it talks about God coming to earth to take upon the form of a man, that it is talking about the God of the Old Testament: Jehovah (Jesus Christ). So many people don't understand that Christ is the God of the Old Testament and that's where the confusing idea of a trinity comes from. I'm so glad that we have the knowledge we have--that we know that God is our Heavenly Father and Christ is his Son.